Left Voice

MASSIVE LAYOFFS IN LEAR AND DONNELLEY

National and provincial deputies demand an emergency meeting with the US embassy

July 04, 2014

National and provincial senators and deputies from various parties formally requested a meeting with the US ambassador in Argentina Kevin Sullivan. They want to discuss the serious situation affecting the employees of the North American multinational companies Lear and Donelley.

With their request they included the different bills that have been submitted in the National Chamber of Deputies and in the Buenos Aires provincial legislature in which the legislators express their concern over the massive layoffs that these companies are carrying out in their factories in Buenos Airesâ€™ Northern suburbs.

Lear and Donnelley are two North American companies that canâ€™t claim to be in any kind of crisis. Lear earned $16 billion in 2013; Donelley is the biggest printing company worldwide and it reports multi-million dollar profits globally.

In their letter requestig a meeting with the US embassy, the legislators pointed out that the â€œLear Corporation has the only factory that produces one autopart in Argentina needed by the local Ford factory. The legislators also noted that the Labor Ministry already found the previuos paid fourloughs of 330 workers in their Pacheco plant illegal because the company failed to submit a finantial distress claim to the ministry before proceding with the suspentions of almost half of the plantâ€™s workers. Later the company kept 200 workers on unpaid leave and went on to fire 100. Regarding the printing company Donneley Argentina S.A. , it is alarming the companyâ€™s intention to fire 123 workers after claiming finantial distress, although it pays the lowest salaries in the sector and it has reported huge profits worldwide in 2013â€ .

The group of legislators had also expressed their concern with the company preventing elected file-and-rank union representatives from entering their work places.